President Donald Trump’s worldwide controversial executive order restricting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries as his plan to tighten national security spawned legal challenges, congressional criticism, widespread protests and confusion at airports, making it the number-one issue in Washington this week, despite nomination hearings and unveiling of Trump’s Supreme Court nominee on Thursday.
In Congress, lawmakers will hold several organizational hearings for the various standing committees, including the House Agriculture Committee. Plus, the Rules Committee will meet on resolutions of disapproval on some Obama administration regulations. Otherwise, the hearing schedules will look at transportation infrastructure, ObamaCare and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) economic outlook.
Economic updates ahead include more housing and services readings, but the biggest attention will be on the monthly jobs update. The schedule is relatively full each day, with Monday releases on Personal Income & Outlays, Pending Home Sales and the Dallas Fed Manufacturing Index followed by reports on Tuesday that include the Employment Cost Index, S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller HPI, Chicago PMI and Consumer Confidence. The first glimpse on jobs data arrives with February on Wednesday with ADP Employment along with PMI Manufacturing, ISM Manufacturing and Construction Spending. The Weekly Jobless Claims and Productivity and Costs data arrive on Thursday with Friday data including the key Employment report, PMI Services, Factory Orders and ISM Non-Manufacturing. Traders will continue to focus on how the data matches up with economic projections from the Fed, the usual focus for traders of late. But as we have seen, traders will also keep an eye on President Trump to try and figure out what the latest moves might end up meaning for the US economy and markets.
The Wednesday conclusion of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) will be an attention-getter. Even though the odds are very low for the Fed to adjust interest rates, the post-meeting statement will be combed through for any hints on when the Fed may increase interest rates. Plus, how the Fed sizes up the current state of the US economy will be important as well. And a current Fed voter is also on the schedule to close out the week once the FOMC blackout is lifted – Chicago Fed’s Evans.
Agriculture interests will be watching weather in South America and the US, with updates this week from some US states on the HRW wheat crop. How the crop fared during January will be the focal point. South American weather is still in focus after the combination of dry and wet conditions in Argentina has caught market attention. From the USDA data side, Today brings the weekly Grain Inspections data followed by the annual Cattle Inventory update on Tuesday. We also arrive at February with the series of industrial reports from USDA that include Fats & Oils Crush, Grain Crushings, wheat use and cotton use. The Weekly Export Sales report on Thursday remains key as traders are expecting soybean sales to continue to decline while the most-recent report showed increased wheat and corn demand. Like traders in other markets, any new actions or statements from the Trump administration will be watched for any potential impacts on agricultural trade prospects for US corn and soybeans in particular.
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